Early Impressions: Dark Souls III

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Dark Souls III [official site] is already out in Japan but the rest of the world has to wait until April 12th. I received review code late last week and have spent a few hours kindling bonfires and carving my way through the early stages of the game. I’ve also, as you might imagine, died quite a lot.

Our full review will be closer to the international release but I wanted to share some thoughts about the opening areas, the PC version and the overall quality of what I’ve seen so far. No spoilers regarding bosses or locations.

It’s good. Possibly very good, although it’s too soon to say how it’ll all hold together. An enormous part of Dark Souls’ appeal is the level design and subtle world-building, and the effectiveness of both of those things isn’t entirely clear until the whole picture can be seen. Right now, I’ve barely seen one edge of the world so can’t be certain that it’ll fit together like a beautiful labyrinth.

Visually, it’s doing all the right things in terms of creating the kind of ruined landscapes, castles and dungeons that are a hallmark of the series. I’ll talk about the technical aspects in a moment but it’s worth spending a few paragraphs to touch on the actual designs.

If you’re in a particularly picturesque part of the world (the real world), you might find signs at certain points along a trail drawing your attention to a good sightseeing spot. Such a spot might provide a view of a panoramic vista or a specific feature, ideally framed.

Dark Souls III is full of spots like that. Lothric might be going through a bit of bother at the moment – something to do with dead kings who need to be returned to their thrones and/or re-killed – but it clearly had a cracking tourist board in better times. I search every nook and cranny in the hope of finding a big stack of souls or something sharp or explosive to lob, but more often than not I just find spectacular views.

Even as I scratch the surface, with only a few bonfires within the initial castle ruins unlocked, I’m able to stitch the world together, connecting one vantage point to the next. There are threads that pull the whole place together, including the disintegrating corpse of a dragon at one section of the high wall that both encircles and penetrates the stronghold, and a fire-spewing living dragon perched atop another part of that wall. Below, there is a cathedral, with neighbouring gardens. The stained glass windows catch the light and draw the eye, and the patches of green round about would make the whole place look like an oasis of calm if it weren’t for the bodies piled high, burning and rotting, and the robotic march of the giant knights that still patrol, even though there is nothing left to guard.

The atmosphere is almost perfect. My one minor concern is tied to the creature design rather than the world design. The Souls games have always delivered on the monster front. They’re full of demons and dragons and knights, but like the worlds they inhabit, those critters aren’t quite what you’d expect. If the ruins are a sort of post-apocalyptic Forgotten Realms – Mad Max meets Middle Earth – then the monsters are typical fantasy fare seen through the lens of surrealist horror. They’re broken, mechanical things, a quality emphasised by their predictable behaviour patterns.

While that horrific quality has been evident since Demon’s Souls, some of Dark Souls III’s depictions of corrupted and bloodied forms feel a little too on the nose. On a couple of occasions, the apparent physical manifestation of ruin spilling out of the bodies of enemies, transforming them, has felt like a visual motif more suited to one of the weaker Silent Hill games than to Dark Souls. It’s the rare occasion when the game feels as if it’s using an exclamation point rather than an ellipsis.

It’s worth noting that this may well be an idiosyncratic criticism targeting an aspect that won’t bother the majority of people, but complaints about the visual aspect of those enemies aside, I also feel as if they’re the cheapest combatants I’ve encountered so far. The corruption, which takes the form of an oily serpentine mutation, is (intentionally) difficult to read, its animations overwhelming and uncomfortable to track.

No doubt some people will enjoy the challenge as they learn to dodge and deflect those messy strikes, but I’ve found them to be frustrating in a way that encourages button-hammering and a reliance on luck rather than a close reading of action and intent. Dark Souls is at its best when it’s teaching you how to succeed, through a process of repetition and gradual improvement. Perfecting almost any sequence of combat, kills and forward motion grants one of the greatest moments of catharsis available in any form of entertainment – all frustrations and despair purged to be replaced by confidence and elation – but in these rare instances I didn’t feel as if I’d earned the progress I made.

The important word is ‘rare’. On the whole, I’ve been delighted by the early hours of the game. Combat has an extra bit of pace and fluidity, but is missing none of the weight of the original Dark Souls, and experimenting with character builds and classes shows just how many solutions are actually possible when faced with seemingly insurmountable obstacles. Surviving a bossfight with a sword and shield in hand, an empty Estus flask and a sliver of health remaining makes that particular victory feel like the only possible happy outcome, but approaching the same encounter with a ranged setup, a two-handed axe or a whisper and a prayer could be just as effective.

My main character is an agile mercenary – cutting, slashing and blocking – and I’m making slow but steady progress. Upgrading weapons and Estus capacity felt like a drag at first, necessitating a trip back to the Firelink Shrine, which is located in a separate, safe hub area, accessible only through teleportation form a bonfire.

I’m becoming accustomed to the Shrine as a separate place though. It gives me time to breathe and to explore stats and character builds, as well as fiddling with Estus balance. That’s a new feature for the game, linked to the FP bar that acts as both mana and ‘skill juice’. In short, both spellcasting and use of new weapon-specific skills drains FP, which can be regenerated using a second variety of Estus Flask, the ‘Ashen’ flask, received during the game’s introductory tutorial.

Two flasks to replenish two bars, health and mana. That seems fair. Dark Souls III is ever-devious though and at the Firelink Shrine you can rebalance the amount of Estus used in each flask, thereby complicating the decisions you’re making even more. A particularly bold player might move all of the Estus capacity to the Ashen flask, giving them plenty of ammunition for spells and skills but not allowing even a single health top-up. I’d love to tell you that I’m good enough to get away with that kind of power-trip but it would be a lie.

The splendid thing about Dark Souls is that no matter how punishing it becomes, you’re rarely limited in your choices. You can teleport to any unlocked bonfire, allowing you to start from any area of the world and approach a problem from the best possible angle, and you can chop and change your character build by adding equipment. Sure, you can’t build a character capable of wielding every weapon and casting every spell effectively, but you won’t up using a totally inflexible character either.

Although I’ve been critical of some of these early experiences, I’m thoroughly enjoying Dark Souls III. Briefly put, at its best the combat is as good as the series has ever produced and the world is so beautifully designed that seeing a new section is reward enough for the trials endured to unlock it. Technically, it’s solid. I’m playing with a 360 pad because mouse and keyboard controls simply don’t make sense in relation to the series for me. The option is there though if you can stomach it.

FRAPS reckons my framerate is fluctuating between 30 and 60, though I rarely notice any changes as I play. That’s most likely because the rate settles in the middle of that range and doesn’t change during combat – the drops are related to large, open vistas, in which many distant points can be seen, with enemies in place, marching and marauding. During combat, the camera tends to be focused on the immediate vicinity and everything is steady. I’m running this machine at 1080p, with settings on Ultra. Knocking them down to High makes very little difference either to the framerate or the graphics.

I’m going back in now, powering through to the finale so that I can bring back a full analysis. Wish me luck.

Our full review will arrive ahead of international release on April 12th.

72 Comments

Fourth to last paragraph is missing a word, though. “Sure, you can’t build a character capable of wielding every weapon and casting every spell effectively, but you won’t [end?] up using a totally inflexible character either.

Provided they go the Dark Souls/Bloodborne route of focusing as much on shortcuts (and areas that are navigable without having to fight every enemy), it’ll just be a tool for the frustrated rather than a necessity. My sole major problem with Dark Souls 2 is that it’s effectively a series of corridors with inevitable ends rather than a cohesive vision, and I suspect that was due to a lack of Miyazaki at the helm. With him back in the director’s chair, it oughta be just fine.

Well, ymmv as the incapacity to fast travel from the get go was one of my biggest gripe with the first episode.

At one point you got to chose if you’re designing a game based on exploration and challenge, or on the boring repetition of mindless tasks, as traveling between bonfires might become once you got the spawns and enemies memorized.

Having a rich and complex level design is only served by letting people easily travel through key points, when they’re in those moments where they’re looking for the next thing to do. There’s nothing worse than becoming bored of these fantastics levels out of the tediousness of going through the same low level enemies for the 500th time.

There’s that, certainly, but on the other hand, unlike DS2 the first game often felt like a risky journey into the unknown. Knowing that no matter how deep you go, you’ll also have to eventually find a way back made the exploration and feeling lost aspect stronger. In DS2, going back to rest and resupply is always trivial, which removes quite a lot of the tension.

But it’s really a question of using the mechanic cleverly rather than one being inherently better than the other.

I’m going to take the extreme view and say that a compromise is not necessary, nor is it ideal for either fence of the issue.

My opinion is that “fast travel” is trying to solve a problem that should not be there in the first place. Having to resort to “fast travel” mechanics to keep your players from being frustrated point to a failure of design. It should be perfectly possible to make a exploration heavy game that does not need FT at all.

Of course making a game with FT is just as legit as making one without. But you should only go for FT if it is core to the vision of your game and not to cover up bad design where lack of FT will make players frustrated.

I would of said the same and I do feel that way about DS2, but Bloodborne makes me realise it can work. As long as the distance between bonfires is not too short and the areas are interconnected, I don’t see it as an issue.

A question on this though. In Bloodborne, which also has a hub area in the form of The Hunter’s Dream, using a lamp would return you to the hub, with no option to rest. If you wanted to refill your items from your stash or reset the world for forming you would have to return to the hub and then come teleport back to the lamp. Does DS3 let you rest at the bonfires, as old DS games did? Having to go through 2 loading screens say a pain in Bloodborne, particular with PS4 loading times!

*the-longest-sigh-ever*
Oh man, I was really (really) hoping they would return to the method of introducing the ability to fast-travel somewhere around half way through the game, like DS1 did it. It worked perfectly fine there, and it added so much tension and hopelessness, just as some commentors mentioned above… ooh well. Indeed!
Welp, let’s wait until we get a proper WIT of the game to see how well it is constructed from a world building perspective.

Now, I just got this single question, and as I’ve been avoiding information about the game like a vampire avoiding the sunlight I haven’t come across it yet:
Can you do all your leveling shenanigans at ANY bonfire (DS1), or do you have to return to some kind of hub (DeS, DS2, BB)? This is of major importance for me!

I am completely with you on this. In DS1 the feeling of finding a useful short-cut was incredible and physically travelling the areas created a tangible mental image of and feeling of prescience in the world. In DS2 the travelling back to level up felt like a piss-take and the bonfires may as well have been portals, it totally took away the concept of respite that the fires represented in DS1.

Been watching some gameplay from my ‘tuber of choice and I gotta say that perhaps I’m suffering from Souls fatigue, but it looks like too much of ‘more of same’. DSII was like that already, and was mostly fine, but third time around, without noticable changes to the issues that persist from the start (mostly collision detection and clipping), it doesn’t excite like it used to. The expansive outdoor areas, dotted with ruins, also make it more similar to the second game than the first, where it was a near constant descent into ever greater depths.

I felt the same after DSII. However, Bloodborne was an absolutely fantastic experience and completely blew my mind, and it made me realize how badly designed was DSII, compared to the other episodes, and how great it felt to have another game by Miyazaki.
From what I’ve seen and heard so far, the experience of DS3 seems to be on par, if not superior, from that of Bloodborne.
Which means, you should not even compare this experience with DS2.

Souls fatigue is very much a thing.
I’ve been suffering it since Dark Souls.

My introduction to Souls was through the gaming section of the YakYak forums. Excitement was high about an import-only PS3 game, Demon’s Souls.
Enough people I trusted were into this game and recommending I play it that I took the plunge and bought an imported North American copy for £70.

It even came with a guide written by the community that told you about certain exploits to make the game less punishing, like firing through the fog at the Maneater boss to make that fight easier.

And I truly, deeply loved it. I played it over and over again, reaching something like NG+ 12.

Then the UK version came out, with European servers making the multiplayer functionality (somewhat) smoother, and I bought that and loved it too. However, I didn’t reach quite the same level with the UK one; already, I had seen so much of what Souls had to offer.

Dark Souls being announced rekindled my interest, but the game took me a long time to get in to compared to Demon’s Souls, mostly because when I started out from Firelink, I went into the catacombs as opposed to venturing into Undead Berg. When it finally clicked, I thoroughly enjoyed it, but it somehow felt less coherent than Demon’s Souls, and the bosses, while memorable, had nothing on Demon’s Souls.
It didn’t stop me buying it a second time however, this time on PC when it came out.

But after completing it and the DLC, I found I couldn’t get excited about Dark Souls 2. In fact, I haven’t been excited about a Souls game since. I know the formula too well, and nothing in the Souls series or its extended family is going to surprise me as much as Demon’s Souls originally did.

See, Demon’s Souls, for my money, still had the bravest and most surprising bosses of the series. And stood at the pinnacle of these warped and twisted monsters was Old Monk.

To my knowledge, From Software haven’t repeated this kind of boss encounter since Demon’s Souls. To be honest, that’s probably a good thing, as it would probably get old fast.
But it’s still one of the standout moments in the history of multiplayer gaming for me, and I’m shocked that it hasn’t been copied wholesale.

I didn’t know what it was the first time I fought it.
It was only later when I found myself being involuntarily summoned while playing the latter stages of Tower of Latria that I finally realised what a truly inspired boss fight this was.

You see, upon getting summoned, I found myself in Old Monk’s shoes.I was the boss.

I even won that first fight as Old Monk (although would lose many later on, either as Old Monk or while trying to beat him), but nothing could take away from the sheer awe at realising what From Software had done.

I can’t comment on Dark Souls 2 or Bloodborne, as I haven’t played them, but while I loved Dark Souls, to me Demon’s Souls will always be the better game. And it set out the rules so successfully, I never really need to play another Souls game.

I’ve always been of the opinion that your first “Souls” game ends up being your favorite.
Doesn’t really matter which one of those it was.
For me Dark Souls 1 was the first and to me will always be the best.
That said, I’m pre-ordered and lined up for Dark Souls 3.
Bring it on….

Honestly, if you’ve played souls games 15+ times, then you’re probably entitled to a bit of fatigue! I wouldn’t play it either.

I’m nowhere near that kind of intensity, but for you, there’s probably a lot of other games you didn’t play in the 1,200 hours or so you’ve spent playing dark souls, so there’s probably a lot of options out there.

I feel the same way. The art direction looks brown, dark with weak shadows, as usual. The bosses look awesome as ever, but like in the article instead of learning it looks more like a bunch of Sif fights. You roll under them, get a couple of swipes, and pray you don’t get hit and then do it again.

You can easily hop right in, as the story and continuity are sparse at best (at least, as a focus of the game itself – the lore’s very deep and super compelling). But you’ll certainly get more out of it in terms of gameplay and narrative if you play the first two games. They’re both excellent (even if the second entry is a bit flawed), and it’s guaranteed to make your time with this one more rewarding.

“Story” wise the Souls games are only loosely connected to each other and you won’t miss out on a whole lot. Unless you really want to get into the lore, but in that case you would have a better time watching fan videos instead. Since most of it isn’t explained in a standard narrative in-game.
Gameplay wise I would imagine it being closer to Dark Souls 2 if you want to get a feel for it, though starting at 1 is recommended.

The thing is, if you like it, chances are you’ll really fucking like it and want to play all of the other souls games immediately after you finish it. So you might just be better off playing Dark Souls, cos it’s cheaper and also pretty much a masterpiece.

1 is very good and worth playing. 2 is good, and only seems less good by comparison. The games are only loosely connected to each other, so you don’t need to worry about missing plot points between games.

Play the first one, just because it’s better than 2 and much cheaper. However, do read up on how to tweak the game to enable better texturing, and other tweaks – it wasn’t the best of ports. There’s at least one RPS article on the essential Dark Souls fixes.

Oh, and play Dark Souls with some kind of gamepad or don’t bother in my opinion. It’s how they were designed.

All of the above, except don’t listen to declarations you need a controller. I’ve played through DS1 several times with m/kb and felt right at home every step of the way.

There are a couple of fixes and some tweaks needed to make m/kb work well with DS1. But once they’re up and running it works fine. Look up DSFix and DSMFix.

Try both control styles and see what works best for you. And if you prefer m/kb (as I do) don’t be afraid to wade into the fixes and tweaks. You’ll thank yourself for the effort up front, because if you like the game you’ll be spending a lot of time in it.

From what I seen so far (mostly everything, because delayed gratification through avoidance of spoilers is not really a concern for me), DS III seems like a significant step down after Bloodborne (to be fair, Bloodborne is probably the best Souls game there is, with the caveat that Blood Vials are a really bad alternative to Estus).
The gameplay is effectively the same as DS I, with some minor ideas implemented from DS II and Bloodborne (eg. powerstance and rally return in slightly altered forms). For the most part, the DS III looks like a dull and grey affair. Spots of color are painfully rare (even Bloodborne, caked in blood and twilight as it was, handled them better) and the enemy designs (both of the mobs and the bosses) certainly lack the mad creativity of Bloodborne. Game seems better than DS II, which is nice. Not sure I’d place it above Dark Souls I. Maybe on par-ish with Demon’s Souls, except that game was a mic drop when it came out, and Dark Souls III is kinda just the fourth, slightly ragged and not very exciting skin off the same fox.

Um. One of the three endings is really, really fucking cool. Like, holy shit cool. Easily the best ending cutscene of any Souls game (I count BB among them). The other two endings are pretty alright too? I guess that’s nice?

Music, also, is sort of a letdown after Bloodborne, which is funny, because it’s composed by the same people as the music in the previous games.

Whatever. I’m just trying to make sure that if I don’t get to have a happy balloon, then nobody else does either.

You’ve articulated a concern I had about the “darkness-cancer” enemies which seem more at home in resi 5 than dark souls (god the windmill-head-tentacle zombies were annoyingly unpredictable). Visual-wise, it feels a bit unnecessary, the black knights were scary because of their elegant, efficient brutality… …although the gaping dragon’s exploded ribcage was pretty horrific.

Seemed to me like a nod to Bloodborne which had the “sudden, violent transformation like in Resident Evil” thing already.
There’s an enemy type that does a similar thing (but not the ruin-snake) later on in the game.

Also, there’s an Onionbro and the bonfire lady says the same thing as the Doll etc

Yeah, I’d kinda like the souls games, as individual entities, to stand on their own a bit more. DSII was full of tributes where there could have been something else. Without having played Bloodbourne (only watched a bit of it played), many enemies seem, erm, rather bloodbourney? From what I’ve seen, there’s lots of very tall/gangly hollows which rather blurs the neat human/giant/monster divide there was in the first two. I mean, Havel being obviously human-sized under all that rock didn’t make him any less of threat.

Please increase the boss HP pool for Dark Souls 3. Right now most of the bosses are very easy to take down even by new players and even when playing on the 1.01 Japanese / PC normal version and not the 1.00 Xbone nerfed version for the press. They have so low HP that typical fights are over in minutes and players can mow them down with their regular un-upgraded longsword with ease. The bosses also have a lot of deadzones which players can exploit. Combine that with their low HP and….yea, most of these bosses are not fun, challenging or exciting. From / Namco, please address this issue and increase the boss HP with a patch.

Having different launch dates is nothing new, it happens all the time. If Western publishers can delay the release of Japanese versions, there’s nothing wrong with Japanese publishers doing the same.

The nerfed version is a press version, not the actual version. This is also something developers and publishers do all the time, as they want to show as much as possible of the game.

Another factor is that some of the people currently streaming Dark Souls 3, like Cohhcarnage, put virtually all of their leveling points in HP, making it more difficult to actually die in the game.

As usual the Final Fantasy swords are as OP as they were in the original Dark Souls.

Lastly, many of the people streaming the game are used to playing Dark Souls games; they know how the combat works and understand the mechanics. So naturally it will not be as difficult as the first Souls game you played. Someone new to the Souls games will struggle a lot more with Dark Souls 3 than those who put hundreds of hours into Dark Souls 1 & 2.

So sure, the game does look easier, I fully agree, but there is more than one explanation for it.

Actually from what I’ve seen, even on the “Standard” version aka not the nerfed version, that is the Japanese PS4 / PC 1.01 version, the bosses were easy because of their low HP pool. The nerfed version was 1.00 Xbone version.

And never mind the Souls vets, I’ve seen new players destroy more than half the bosses in the game with relative ease with normal long sword. The bosses are easy to exploit due to their deadzone attacks and low HP pool. If their HP pool were increased, they would be more of a challenge instead of pushover. Their HP is so low, you could just brute force / Estus chug / hack n slash your way to victory and the fights will be over within minutes.

From / Namco needs to seriously address this issue at / before the launch of the game on April 12th and increase their boss HP.

The very little I’ve allowed myself to see has made me very excited to get lost again. I do echo others concerns of bonfires being warp-able so early on though. I loved the stress and wonder of not knowing how far/deep I needed to go before I’d be able to loop back to firelink. In any case, don’t you dare go hollow.

I’ve been pondering over the same decision – the PS4 has some advantages but I think the main one is that no-one will be cheating online. Cheating was rife in DS1 on PC (one of my all time favourites by the way) and even if you didn’t find a blatant case of it there’s many people out there admitting to cheating slightly so it wasn’t obvious. I was tempted myself but never got round to it!

Out of curiosity, does anyone else find it odd, its been out for a week now? But I haven’t seen anything, or heard anything about any OMG moments, or major spoilers? In this day and age that to me is weird, not that ive been looking, but yea weird.